Publication Order of Lauren Rousseau Mystery Books

Tace Baker is one of the pseudonyms used by author Edith Maxwell for writing down one of her mystery series. She chose this name because it is an old style Quaker name, which seemed fitting for her being an author of the series depicting a professor of Quaker Linguistics. Author Tace popularly writes the Lauren Rousseau series, which consists of two books as of now. The series is currently going on as author Tace is working on a new plot and is in the process of developing it into a book. Author Tace says that she was always interested in linguistics and languages. She has even traveled to a number of places of the world just to pursue her interests of linguistics. Due to such interests of author Tace, it does not surprise the readers the main character of her novel series, Lauren Rosseau, is also a polyglot and has very keen ears for the accents of the style of English speaking of the native and non-native speakers. Under her original name, author Tace has written a cozy mystery series called as the Local Foods Mysteries. This series features an organic farmer named Cameron Flaherty, who gets indulged in several locally sourced murders at the time of the harvesting seasons of her organic produce.

Under another pen name called Maddie Day, author Tace has written the Country Store Mystery series. Both these series have been published by the Kensington publication. Other than the mystery novel series, author Tace has also written several short stories of crime fiction, which have helped her win a few prestigious awards. Author Tace says becoming an author was on her mind since her childhood days. Creating short and long fiction stories has always been her passion. For more than 2 decades in the beginning of her professional career, author Tace used to work as a technical document writer in a software company. Before that job, she used to a number of freelance stories and articles. She had also penned down several doctoral dissertations for companies in the Linguistics field. And before that also, author Tace used to write news articles and fiction stories during her childhood and teenage days. Apart from writing mystery books, author Tace spends time in a number of writers’ associations as an active member. Some of the well known writers’ groups that she is part of include, the MWA, the Sisters in Crime, and several other subgroups. Author Tace is also listed in the board members’ list of the chapter of New England of the Sisters in Crime association. Other than these things, author Tace is also associated with the Friends Society (Quaker), just like the main protagonist Lauren Rousseau of her third mystery series. Tace Baker has described that Lauren Rousseau had a small time boyfriend, who used to work on a video forensics system. This is the same system for which author Tace has written several manuals in the actual sense during one of her freelance jobs. The success of the mystery novels of author Tace helped her to establish herself as one of the prominent authors of her time. It also helped her to get nominated for the prestigious Agatha Award, however, she was not able to win it.

The Lauren Rousseau mystery series written by author Tace Baker consists of 2 books in total. They were published between the years 2012 and 2014. The debut book of this series was released under the title ‘Speaking of Murder’. This book was published in the year 2012 by the Barking Rain publishers. At the start of the book, it is depicted that a talented student from a small college in New England gets murdered. After this, Lauren Rousseau is introduced as a professor of linguistics at the same college. After coming to about the murder of the talented student, she is thrust into the search of the persons responsible for the murder. Lauren appears to be a determined Quaker, who has the habit of putting her ear to the accents of the English speakers around her. As she moves ahead with her investigation of the murder case, she goes on exposing the intrigues of the small town as well as the academic blackmails. Lauren also comes to know about the clandestine drug cartel who seems to have a vast network of distribution all over the college as well as the town. After knowing about the activities of Lauren, the drug cartel sets his eyes on her. Lauren studies everything about the life and activities of the dead student and becomes convinced that the clues to the killer lie in his thesis. As she races to solve the murder mystery, she escalates closer to the circle of misfortune. Soon, she comes to know that her department chair is behaving in an unusual manner. After some time, a very old local boat shop is set on fire and one of the close friends of Lauren Rousseau goes missing. Also, in such difficult and testing times, her unsettled relationship of love with her boyfriend begins to cause troubles in her investigation process. In order to hunt down the killer, Lauren looks for some desperate help and a divine intervention.

The second book in the Lauren Rousseau series was titled as ‘Bluffing is Murder’. It was also published by the Barking Rain publication in the year 2014. Just like the previous book of the series, this book too revolves around the happenings in the life of the main protagonist named Lauren Rousseau. At the beginning of the story, Lauren is shown as living in Massachusetts, enjoying the warm climate of the summer season. Her boyfriend named Zac goes back to his hometown in Haiti in order to meet his family members, leaving behind Lauren all by herself in Ashford, Massachusetts. During such times, the danger does not seem to be too far from this famous Quaker linguistics professor. In an attempt to get over with the murder case of one of her talented students, she decided to return back to her karate classes and brush up her skills. Lauren finds herself drawn towards the handsome Sensei instructor named Dan Talbot. While running along the seaside, Lauren comes across the dead body of her insurgence agent named Charles Heard, who was one of the trustees of an old land trust of the country. On the previous day, she was seen having a verbal spat with Charles publicly over a policy. Due to this, she becomes the prime suspect in the murder case of Charles Heard. With the intention of clearing her name of the murder case, she sets out herself to find out the real story about the mismanaged dealings of the land trust. In doing so, Lauren comes across the volatile sister of Charles and a link to the mysterious death of her own father over a decade ago. After several close encounters with dangerous situations, Lauren Rousseau becomes certain that someone is trying to make her a target and is closing in very quickly. Now, she is required to race against time and catch the killer before she becomes his latest victim.

With the latest book in the Gray Man series by Mark Greaney coming out soon, we wanted to make the very first book in the series our book of the month.

Greaney is an incredible author and if you love the "lone badass" type of books then you will LOVE the Court "Gray Man" Gentry series. Read more about it.

Featured Series

It might seem like overkill, but we're giving The Gray Man series our featured series of the month.

Honestly this is such a great series and we feel not enough people read it so we want to push it. Read more about The Gray Man series and seriously if you haven't read it - start! Amazing thrillers.

Featured Author

Mark Greaney is an incredibly talented author. Not only does he write the Gray Man series however he also writes various Jack Ryan novels. Many feel he is the best writer of them and he truly is a great author. We're happy to award our author of the month to Mark Greaney.

Did You Know…

In her mid thirties Enid Blyton went through some crisis in her life which included the death of her father. This troubled her emotionally and she began to show signs of instability. She started post marital affairs and in 1941 divorced her husband to marry Kenneth Fraser, a man she had met while she was still with her first husband. However she remained in her second marriage for the rest of her life.